


Monody

by taedragon (orphan_account)



Series: Pentacron [1]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Angst, Control Issues, Fantasy, Forbidden Love, Horror, Love at First Sight, M/M, Romance, Royalty, Thriller, yutae vs yusol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-16
Updated: 2016-05-16
Packaged: 2018-06-08 19:30:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6870520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/taedragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For Yuta, it's the beginning of a nightmare that never ends.<br/>[discontinued]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dissimulation

**Author's Note:**

> for mey who made [this](http://taedragon.tumblr.com/post/143883045615/monody-hansolyuta-onesidedtaeyongyuta-r) beautiful edit for this fic, thank you so much ily !  
>  ~~ridiculously cheesy~~

It begins with the chime of the bell. Wind howls, courtiers, soldiers, knights and peasants alike lay down their incense sticks and chaplets before advancing towards the area surrounded by a small circlet, to add to them, all clad in black robes- as convention dictated. Their movements are slow, their heads lowered and hearts heavy.

The King had died.

The mourning wasn’t vocalized, the only sounds piercing the air were the faint sobs from the Queen. Her child, a strong lad of nineteen stood by her, giving her hand a comforting squeeze. His expression was stoical, one couldn’t guess correctly what went in his mind as he looked at his father’s open grave, bedecked with flowers and ribbons of royal insignia. Those who looked at him were steadily shocked.

The Prince of Ennismore wasn’t allowed to come into open crowd until he was twenty.

But HanSol had come, he had never known his father as well as a son should have and he sure as hell didn’t give a damn about the restrictions royalty have for baseless reasons. He was, to his father, a mere prince; not a son, not a child to love- simply a boy who happened to be capable enough to be chosen by The Council as heir.

HanSol grits his teeth.

_Fucking pathetic, you old man._

The crowd of onlookers now shift their focus to the Prince, HanSol proceeds to look down, knowing the attention is on him once the rites are over.

_Fucking pathetic._

The royal family stays till evening while the rest leave. The graveyard looks empty, green grass uniformly swaying along with the trees bordering the walled expanse. Chilly air brings shivers down his spine and HanSol turns his head to evade the harsh stings of cold.

And that is when he first sees him.

Purely coincidental, if it may be defined. Sharp eyes enabled him to see past the short statured trees, it was clear that there was  _someone_.

And that  _someone_  was watching him.

From what HanSol could see, it was a boy, in black that too. Perhaps he came for the funeral? That seemed unlikely, every other should have gone by then. His face was covered up by a black fabric tightened behind his head.

But it wasn’t these oddities that made HanSol feel spellbound. It were the  _eyes_.

Their eyes met and the Prince couldn’t find it in himself to turn away. Hypnotic, even from a distance they turned him to stone. This funeral ceremony was the first time he was out in the open, but he had observed people, seen courtesans swaggering into chambers of his relatives, all were none so impressive- so he hadn’t been expecting a person’s eyes to be so subtle and aggressive at the same time.

“Beautiful,” he lets out silently, still gazing into those eyes and suddenly, as if the boy had heard him, he quickly disappears. HanSol takes a step in pursuit but then he stops.

“Young Master!” he hears one of the knights call.

HanSol turns behind, the knight kneels, “What is it?”

“By night we must reach the palace. It would be best if we started now, by your leave”

“Very well,” HanSol says, still not ready to let the haunting image of those brown eyes go, “Let us then.”

 

 

 

 

“Are you imprisoning me, mother?” the Prince asks humorously as they walk past the administrative chambers. The palace is mainly a government building, since he is to be heir it’s preferable he moves in here to gain practical knowledge about the affairs of state.

It’s all foreign, new doors, new servants... everything is new.

All the more reason to be cautious.

“You need a safe place to stay. We have never lived here, in this main palace. The last thing I want is for my child to end up assassinated, like my husband- do you hear me?”

HanSol sighs,  _sometimes, you shut up and obey._  “Yes, I do.”

To be chosen as heir, he had a number of responsibilities. His mother led him to a chamber at the end of a short anomalous staircase and handed him a thick iron key.

“To no one, do you speak of this,” she warns him and leaves.

The first of those responsibilities was: _save your own head before someone chops it off._

The stench of newly painted wood invades the Prince's nose as he looks onto it.  _Clever,_ he thinks. Anyone would mistake it for a granary door, or a repository for rusted metal. He felt relieved.

A monarch’s death usually meant the onset of oppression.

He had faith in himself, trained for the sword since a toddler- he knew his blade better than the back of his hand. He expected himself to have grown bulkier by now but well,  _damnation on genetic traits,_  he thinks.

The key goes into the hole of the door, it doesn’t turn by little force, he deducts, by the size of it.

HanSol turns the key and opens the door to what might be the beginning of a new chapter in his life.

 

 

 

 

"Is this the place?"

"Yes, Your Majesty," one of the soldiers undoes the ribbon on the ornate door handles and lets HanSol advance into the room. _They say the room hasn't been used since the day the King was murdered in there- superstitious, HanSol observed._

The Prince huffs as he enters, the room has one row of windows facing the taller trees bordering the castle. The place smells of blood and sandalwood. Any idiot could realise that this was practically a shooting ground.

HanSol keeps walking, but stops at the huge blood stain on the floor. There is a blue rose placed with utmost care right in the centre.

With an eyebrow raised, he questions the soldier he brought along to escort him here, "Did no one want to clean this?"

The soldier shivers and stutters, "But that is royal blood Y-Your Majesty!"

"Never mind," HanSol shakes off the stoned pull in his chest. "He was shot here, by an arrow you say"

"Not by an arrow Sire," the soldier mutters timidly, "it was a sword"

"A sword?"

The soldier nods and HanSol turns his to face the smashed window left intact after the attack that killed his father.

_Could this be...?_

He looks at the rose, annoyed, not many know its significance, that is hidden due to a reason or else crowds of people would go berserk at the very sight of one.

One thing that few do know is that roses do not grow in Ennismore.

HanSol kicks the rose as he leaves.  _Torlans and their menacing ways._ His head is hot with fury, strides growing impatient by the passing second moving towards JaeHyun's chamber.

He needs to think. He needs to be tactful. No one is to be trusted.

He pushes open JaeHyun's door and the younger looks up at his older brother looking disturbed because of the horrid look of frustration that is set on HanSol's face.

"Han-" the heir interrupts him with a toss of that blue rose on the bed JaeHyun sat on. "We're not safe. Not me and especially not you."

"What do you want me to do then?" JaeHyun asks earnestly and sincerely, he knows he can count on the elder's decisions.

"No one has seen you outside of the palace officials and other high guards so you can make an easy escape," HanSol says dully, "if you make it  _now_. And I feel that it's best for you to do that but figure something out for me before you pack up."

JaeHyun waits for his question. HanSol clears his throat and sits on the bed with hands folded. "How exactly did the old man get killed in a  _single strike?_ "

JaeHyun exhales tentatively. "I...I went into that room before you and there was something I noticed."

"It wasn't just a random attack based on a tiny stratagem," JaeHyun continues, "The attacker knew old man was blind of one eye, thereby choosing that very angle to shoot."

HanSol lets his head drop. _I knew this wasn't going to be easy_. JaeHyun places a comforting hand on his shoulder but it doesn't do much. "The victim is studied before the havoc that the hunter wants is hauled on him. They have good sources to find out flaws, whoever they are."

With that the elder gets up and leaves a last "Hurry up and leave before tomorrow night," to JaeHyun and slams the door as he exits.

_How exactly are they going to gun me down?_

Torlans know, know very well how to weild a sword as if it is a dagger. How to stab any unsuspecting with unmatched precision even from an insurmountable distance - if any one is the best at it, it is Torlans.

And if anyone is best at leaving blue roses to mark their presence, it is Torlans.

_They're here._

 

 

 

 

Hansol learns that nights are windier here in the capital. When the full moon comes out, there's not much need of a candle, the stars and their luminescent master pour silver light down to HanSol's balcony, giving it the appearance of an ethereal stream decked with glittering stars. He's pushed away from officials, his mother doesn't wish for him to speak to anyone- not even his brother so often.  _JaeHyun is still a child though smart,_  HanSol thinks,  _all he does and should do is play around with Kun_. It's unnerving, knowing that no place is without danger lurking in the shadows and there isn't a night where HanSol feels the weight of an imaginary sword alight on the back of his neck.

He feels a blade and jerks back.

There is no one, his eyes tell him. There can't be anyone. There is simply an open balcony on which he's seated, a garden below which he can see clearly in the moonlight, no one can hide behind the trees as far as he thinks because there should be guards but-

_Shit._

There are no guards amidst the trees.

HanSol remains resolute.  _That doesn't matter, no one knows who I am._  He grabs his jug of water and leaves to sleep but the uncoordinated sound of a branch breaking in amongst the wind combing through the swaying treetops doesn't go unnoticed.

_Turn back HanSol, it's probably a squirrel. Or another animal, it's safe to turn._

HanSol turns too see what had snapped and  _those eyes_  look back into his. The sight turns him to stone.

_That boy. From the funeral day._  

_He._

HanSol remembers his build well let alone his eyes which had haunted his mind since that day. Tonight, he wears no mask, HanSol can see his face, he almost lets out a hesitant, breathy whisper, "Who are you?"

A ghost of a smile appears on the boy's lips as he turns away and disappears into the dense trees.

Once Hansol thinks that he can feel his limbs functional, he goes inside his cell of a room, plopping himself on the bed; listening for hours how his heartbeat resonated loud and clear at every instant he thought of the boy he saw.

_Who are you?_

Sleep didn't come easy thereafter.

 

 

 

 

He bids JaeHyun goodbye, they hold their joined hands up swearing to see each other exactly after two years. 

HanSol heaves off a sigh of relief,  _If I don't make it alive out of this political mess, I'm sure he will._

He is met with Kun standing in front of the stairs leading up to the long hallway before his room. It shocks him because the minister's son should not be in here.

"You sent him away," the pale boy says emotionlessly.

"It was meant to be done," HanSol replies coldly and then pats his shoulder, "Go get some sleep, there's lots of work waiting for you too."

He doesn't notice how Kun is red with anger at parting with his best friend.

 

 

 

 

HanSol spends most of his time in the library, fiddling with scrolls and mismatching their rings until one of the maids comes to his help. He finds books to read as well but often falls asleep after finishing about a dozen in a day. 

"HanSol," Johnny says and HanSol wakes up, ends of books jabbing into his body and a jolt of pain dissolving too slowly to his comfort. He blinks weakly at his friend, "Nghh?"

"You can't keep sleeping in the most absurd places, what if something happens to you?" Johnny tells him and HanSol immediately gets to his feet with guilt, mumbling his thank yous to Johnny for looking after him and then promising to make it safely back to his chamber.

This night, like every night, feels ominous.

HanSol eagerly opens the door to the balcony as he does every full moon night, when he can see the garden beneath shining and sit on the thick barrier to let his feet dangle meters above the ground. It's not that much of a low jump but HanSol doesn't want people to wake up.

_Tomorrow,_  he thinks.  _Coronation preparations start._

When HanSol turns his head to his right, the boy is there. He comes there, most full moon nights and HanSol finds his worries disappear at the sight of the boy. This time perched on the tree branch closer to the balcony. Two huge leaps and h'ed be beside HanSol.

So close that it's frightening.

_Be cautious,_  a part of HanSol says.  _You don't know who he is._

_Or what he's here for._

But HanSol trusts his instincts and internally he lets himself settle for 'It is alright. Even if he means harm, I got this.' The Prince walks steadily to the edge and doesn't expect to be stunned breathless by the boys profile.

_Absolutely beautiful._

His lips are parted and pink, HanSol can see how he gasps at the unexpected gesture HanSol had shown by coming closer which he hadn't all those full moon nights they'd simply spent looking at each other from afar. HanSol feels his veins thrum with fire, he wants to know how those lips move when they say his name, how the boy's eyes look from up close or if HanSol would never stop staring if he got to see them from even an arm's length.

HanSol has been watching his back, cautious to avoid every possible occurrence on his part which would lead to his own death (except for maybe recklessly sleeping in the library till late) but tonight, he just wants so much from this mysterious boy who is the most exquisite thing he has ever laid his eyes on and though not identifying what specifically, he simply wants him.

Swords flying like daggers or whatever, he doesn't care anymore.

He looks at the boy unshaken as he leans against the boundary. The boy looks afraid, but then before HanSol could open his mouth to speak, he cuts in with a voice that pierces his ears- not because it is shrill since it isn't, there's a ring of smoothness in it, it sounds musical and is better than anything HanSol has heard in his life.

"I thought you wouldn't come this night," he says and HanSol smiles.

The boy was waiting. The fact that he waits every full moon night for HanSol to come to the balcony lights up a spark of hope in him.  _He wants to see me._  He is forced to think,  _Does he want to as much as I do?_  The Prince looks into his enchanting eyes, wanting to send speechless messages to him,  _do you think of me when you aren't here?_

The boy blushes and HanSol almost feels his own cheeks heat up as he leans forward to anticipate the boys movements as he fidgets around the branch. HanSol is thunder struck with awe, not believing he is this close despite his resolve to maintain distances.

He badly wants to break rules.

"Come," the Prince extends his hand curtly and the boy backs away before shyly coming closer and making a light jump beside HanSol on the balcony. Hansol is so busy staring at him that he doesn't realize his arm is still lifted up mid air until the boy places his own hand there, the warmth running all over his body from the fragile touch.

They sit there, on the boundary in the time that was left of that night. With no words exchanged verbally but HanSol would argue the boys eyes and his little presses into HanSol's palm spoke volumes in themselves.

The boy leaves, with an unspoken promise of coming every next full moon night- which HanSol knows he keeps well since he never fails to do so. He gets used to this, the boy sitting beside him with his tiny perfectly shaped hand in his own calloused one, both staring up at the sky for what feels like an eternity of peace.

Then his skin pricks because there are so many things he wants to know. A name if that's the least.

It wouldn't hurt to ask his name, if not anything else.

 

 

 

 

HanSol waits. It's only two days before he would be crowned and the palace only silences its over excited preparations when it's night time. 

The moon is high up in the sky as the boy approaches like he does every full moon night, steps confidently taken towards HanSol, pink lips pressed into a tantalizing smile, he always wears black robes with a black scarf wound tight around his neck.

Simplicity has never been so seductive to a Prince accustomed to the pomp and show of court.

HanSol has lost count of the times he has felt pinned to the floor by just looking at him. He takes his hand in his like always, holding it firmly and fighting the urge to pull him closer.

_The things you do to me._

HanSol momentarily decides to break the chain of nights with no verbalization. He speaks out, not expecting to sound so desperate but he does earn a wide eye from the boy.

"What is your name?"

The wide brown eyes turn into crescents as the boy gives him a bright smile and digs his hand into his robe to draw out a sword.

It's sheathed, but it looks maleficent just the same.

HanSol looks nervy at the sight of the unusual sword. It isn't a common kind, it looks well crafted and rare.

"If I win a duel, I will tell you," he says and raises his eyebrow whilst smirking at him in the spirit of challenge as if to ask if HanSol was up for it.

And HanSol pulls out his own sword from his back in affirmation.

_You bet I am._

Seconds after the first clash of both swords and all the confidence HanSol had in his skills are crushed to plain fear as he is easily overpowered by the boy. His aims fall weaker with sweat trickling down his shoulders in his hazed frustration. He almost feels like all those years of training were for nothing.

But he is mesmerized, the boy moves with agility, the strikes are hurried and stances well practiced. HanSol knows he cannot beat this.

_He's too fast._

The duel ends when HanSol falls to his knees and the boy points his sword right in front of the prince's neck, looking victorious and mirthful at the easy win. HanSol is frozen to the core but the boy quickly withdraws his sword and sheathes it with a chuckle.

For someone who is afraid and almost shivering, HanSol finds that melodious laugh tug at his heart.

"You should have seen how you looked," the boy says delightfully, "you looked as if I would actually kill you."

 His words aren't comforting.

_Yeah, for a second I thought you were actually going to kill me._

"I will get your name someday," HanSol says smiling up at him and the boy comes closer, as close as HanSol has always wanted him to come. He sits before him and then leans back to nestle his head on HanSol's lap, letting the Prince run his fingers through his brown locks. 

"You might not, you're not half as good as I am. Besides," he stares up at HanSol and his heart misses two beats it seems, "I think I earned  _your name._ "

"HanSol," the Prince says and the boy repeats it, his lips moving just as he'd earlier thought. "That sounds like a beautiful name to me... And," he avoids eye contact and shyly mumbles, "my name is Yuta; you look like you have been keen to know all this time so I'll let it slip." He beams up at the Prince and time stops for HanSol.

_So damn beautiful._

HanSol strokes Yuta's forehead and hums in response. If only nights were longer and if only he wouldn't be bound to move to the main wing of the Palace after being King. Yuta closes his eyes and HanSol gazes at the pale face. _Happiness,_  HanSol wishes,  _if only you were easily wrought._

He goes to sleep once Yuta leaves, not wanting to reveal that they probably wouldn't see each other (though HanSol would willingly take the risk to come there every full moon night). It isn't easy for him, he shouldn't have gotten so attached to Yuta- it's only a name that he knows. The identity of this mysterious boy remains a question, but he shrugs the uneasy feeling off.

When sleep conquers him and lulls him to rest, a hand places a tiny blue rose before his door.

 

 

 

 

The first thing that catches his attention as he wakes up is his amulet missing.  _Did I drop it somewhere?_  He thinks and pushes open the door only to be numbed by the little blue rose rolling down the steps before him. 

_This can't be..._

Shaken by the defeat from last night, HanSol is certainly not okay with how events were turning.

_You've found me. When are you going to come kill me?_

He runs to Johnny who he knew would be in the library, still in the clothes he slept in.

"Woah, what HanSol?" Johnny exclaims in shock at the sudden appearance of his friend.

"How- how do Torlans look like?" HanSol pants balancing himself on his arms leant on the table.

"Human beings?" Johnny replies, thinking the question is absurd.

"They're human beings alright! Any particular facial feature, dominant trait- anything at all?"

Johnny falls silent but then speaks, "Well there always has been a rumor that Torlans have the tattoo of a blue rose on their necks. It's an ignored fact though."

"Its credibility?"

"I believe it. I've been to Torlan, anyone without a tattoo is killed on sight."

HanSol heaves out a sigh of relief.  _So a tattoo is what I have to watch for._

 

 

 

 

HanSol is preoccupied with preparations for his coronation. It isn't as much of a matter that would pass by easily, there are princes from other kingdoms coming to visit and distant relatives and it's all a blatant waste of time to him. He'd prefer having Yuta in his arms over anything.

Yeri, his cousin, walks with HanSol in the gardens humming an unfamiliar tune. Strolls with Yeri are better than conversing with a thousand unknown people in multiple trips. The Prince thinks of brown eyes and Yuta's soft voice as he tries to keep up, but is tired after the days work.

"How does it feel, to finally get to be King?" she asks him with childish excitement. HanSol stops and takes a seat, watching the pink evening sky, "What do you mean finally? I wasn't waiting for this."

"It's your destiny," she says seriously.

"I wish it wasn't," he says dejectedly, "and I don't believe in destiny."

"But you believe in reasons," Yeri's voice smoothes out as she begins to speak gently. "There is a reason why you're firstborn."

"It's not that I deserve to be on the throne, Yeri," he sighs, "It doesn't feel right."

"Well then you can always push the load of administration onto someone else's shoulders and then drink your way to happiness," she says and sits beside him with a grin.

"As if" and on hearing this she gives out a hearty laugh.

"If I'd be queen, I would love to spend my time in anything but the country affairs. That would prove the best kind of life- don't you look forward to it? You're already loved and feared. More than half the princesses and princes invited for tomorrow have already fallen for you- you're the King, isn't it exciting?"

HanSol scoffs and looks down. King of all hearts but one.

"Cousin HanSol," her tone turns inquisitive and eyes sparkle with curiosity. "Why do you frown so often? Is something bothering you?"

He returns a weak smile and pats her head. "I might get killed, because of this stupid kingship I didn't ask for."

Yeri's face covers with sadness. "We're all prepared, but I trust that nothing will happen to you; you're strong, stronger than any warrior I've seen."

_You should have seen me helpless and defeated then you'd change your thoughts._

"But I don't think it is the fear of being assassinated that makes you so glum; you look like a lover weeping for a last sight of your love."

How Yeri manages to pull out the truth hidden in the ground of HanSol's self-imposed misery, HanSol is stunned by it. Of course he's dull, the thought of not being able to see Yuta destroys him.

"Are you in love?" she asks him and he gets up to walk to his chambers at the view of the disappearing sun.

_Am I in love? Has craving Yuta come this far?_

 

 

 

 

HanSol has gotten used to finding Yuta seated on the boundary every time he opens the door to his balcony in the night. But he never gets used to what looking at Yuta waiting for him with the hand he'd been wanting to hold all day right there in front, does to him. He won't get used to the flutter in his chest, the pounding of his heart loud in his ears. 

HanSol brings Yuta's hand up and places a kiss on the back of it. He would intertwine his fingers with his but this time he notices that Yuta's hand smells like roses.

It is only then HanSol realizes Yuta never takes off his scarf even though the season doesn't require one. It's black, not creased not folded but wound too tightly round his neck to be comfortable.

HanSol gulps. Yuta seems oblivious to the tensed look the former has and turns to him, smiling. His gaze drops to HanSol's lap. Yuta scoots closer, eyes fixed on HanSol's own wide ones and he settles in the space between HanSol's legs, his back pressed to the taller's front and head resting on the soon-to-be-king's chest.

HanSol wraps his arms around him and props his chin over Yuta's head.

_Breathe. Breathe and forget that you're getting crowned tomorrow. Breathe and forget that you might not see Yuta again._

Yuta notices the erratic breathing and peers up at him, worried. HanSol curses in his mind because he doesn't want to be looking at Yuta's concerned pair of brown orbs.

All of Yuta makes him want to run away. He is happy with Yuta, not with wandering from room to room in the royal palace with a thousand provinces to look after. He is content with Yuta's palm pressed against his own, not the leather of the sword he always has hanging beneath his shirt for fear of his own life. He can't have Yuta always and that emptiness would grow and consume him he thinks.

It isn't fair. And it saddens him.

He pulls Yuta closer to him with longing to hold him near some more, the Prince's head stays above Yuta's shoulders and once again, the smell of roses breaks into his system, jerking him back to the responsibilities which made him.

"Is something wrong?" Yuta asks and brings his left hand to HanSol's cheek and the burning touch instantly dissipates the sudden burst of adrenaline.

_Yuta...all the inexplicable things you do to me...how you calm me down...how much you make me want you...am I in love with you?_

HanSol speaks, bluntly. "One more duel."

Yuta giggles, "for what?"

HanSol clasps his large over Yuta's and rubs circles over it. "There are some things I want to know."

There is undeniable fear in Yuta's eyes HanSol helps them up and unsheathes his sword.

Yuta isn't in his top form this night. HanSol is aggressive, aiming at vital places which were close to impossible to defend. He grows angrier, he can't control it and Yuta weakens; he is worried. HanSol wants to win this time- he lets the frustration pent up from all those days, how fucked his life was, how he couldn't even feel protected in his own skin, how everything would change for him once the golden crown drops on his head and the worst of all,

HanSol flings away Yuta's sword and it glides into a corner with a clang.

_I might lose Yuta._

Yuta falls to his knees, feeling guilt for nothing. It hurts him, seeing HanSol so angry and broken. The Prince runs a hand over his sweaty forehead and brings his sword to Yuta's neck, just like how Yuta had done the last time, only the sword is closer to the shorter boy's neck. Yuta gulps, the colour evaporates from his face and he doesn't dare move. The tip of HanSol's sword is hovering under his chin, dangerously close to his neck, threateningly.

The night falls dead silent.

HanSol cleanly cuts the black scarf and watches as it falls back, pushed by the wind.

A tattooed blue rose shines in the moonlight from the skin on Yuta's neck. HanSol goes mute, not finding it in himself to utter a word. Pangs of betrayal hit him continuously.

Yuta doesn't move. He lets his head hang low, avoiding HanSol's wet eyes.

HanSol should have seen this coming.

He throws his own sword away, walks hastily, yanking Yuta forward to join their lips in a harsh, forceful yet passionate kiss. HanSol's body is on fire, he kisses Yuta with all his might and desire and somewhere in between the rough press of lips, HanSol tastes salt and pulls back to see Yuta with tears running down his face.

There are two emotions HanSol now sees in those brown eyes that he fell for.

Guilt and love.

HanSol cups the shorter's cheek gently and whispers, heart heavy with hurt, lips ghosting over Yuta's pink, swollen ones.

What HanSol's says nearly makes Yuta let out another stream of tears.

"Everything...was a lie wasn't it?"

Yuta wipes his tears and looks sideways, not wanting to face HanSol. Even though the Prince hates blue roses, the tattoo looks beautiful painted on Yuta's neck and even if Yuta is from Torlan, even if he had actually come to harm, even if all of those nights they spent sitting together meant nothing to Yuta- HanSol forgives him.

Yuta presses his lips into a thin line and meets his eyes weakly. HanSol kneels closer to him and strokes Yuta's jaw with his knuckles lightly, all the while the look of love and fondness never leaving him. "My love for you..was never a lie," Yuta chokes out and closes his eyes to expect the worst.

"I-I knew you were the prince. I've known who you are for a long time and- this was supposed to be a mission but I can't do it," Yuta stares right through his soul, his voice rising and cracking as he continues, "I can't kill you as I was ordered to because I'm-" he takes in a sharp strangled breath and fists his hand in HanSol's shirt and he lets a few drops of brine fall on his shoulder, " _I'm so in love with you._ "

HanSol wastes no second, pushes Yuta back on the stone floor, molding their lips together, this time softer like they've got all the time in the world. Yuta's heart hammers in his chest as he kisses back and lets his right hand creep up to entangle in HanSol's golden hair. HanSol lets his mouth drag from the corner of Yuta's lips to the spot below his ear and Yuta writhes at the contact.

HanSol traces a trail up Yuta's leg through the slit in his black robe and detaches his lips to gaze at him imploringly.

"May I?"

"Why do you ask?" Yuta says and brings HanSol closer to press on his forehead affectionately. He smiles, and HanSol bends down to bite over the tattoo, teeth bruising it in an attempt to cover.

"I'm yours," Yuta says and HanSol feels true contentment which he believed couldn't exist but it does. He lets his lips memorize every crook of Yuta's skin-  _I love you_  he says in between pauses and both hold on to each other, wishing the night never ended.

 

 

 

 

The next morning, HanSol finds no Yuta beside him. HanSol knows that though he feels empty, he can't do anything about it. 

He gets crowned, followed by a deafening cheers and hollering.

The one person that he would want most to be there to see him, isn't there.

The next few full moon nights, there are no sounds of light footsteps approaching, the nights are the same, energetic and silvery, but they've lost their magic.

Yuta doesn't come. HanSol understands.

Even though he doesn't anymore, he will, HanSol believes as he looks up at the moon, holding onto that.

He might be King, he might be overlord of enormous spread acreage, but nothing compares to that feeling of victory when he felt like the king over Yuta's heart.


	2. Disseverance

_ _

_  
_

_Torlan.  
  
Forts within forts, lies within lies.  
  
Shadows of the high walls covering the people and reminding them what freedom is.  
  
Freedom is what sits atop the walls. You can see it, but you can never reach it. This is what the walls remind them. Every single time.  
  
Torlan born never see foreign sky, never know anything other than what is within grey walls.  
  
They say if you venture close enough to touch, the palace officials kill you.  
  
The streets of Torlan.  
  
There's an unspoken rule; walk with your head high, let the tattoo on your neck shine or else you are good as a dead skull once the espionage suspects you to have a fake one.  
  
The markets brim with people, they may look like they're smiling and diving into frivolous conversation but everyone knows that they don't want it.  
  
They don't want to live like this. Under the iron hand of the king, under his cruel reign.  
  
Even if they're well paid, well fed- it isn't the best kind of knowledge to have, that the kingdom they belong to is one under a murderer.  
  
But then, everyone is a murderer here.  
  
The place rots of blood, reeks of conspiracy, breathes treason, lives for satiating greed.  
  
But can they rebel?  
_  
  
"TaeYong what are you writing?" His father, high king of Torlan, asks him. Momentarily, TaeYong freezes, caught midway in shock. A curse generates in his head but he lets his pen drop at rebel.  
  
"Some decree General Liu wanted me to draft," TaeYong lies, as if he were stating facts, but the sincerity of his tone convinces the king. TaeYong knows, it's been years since the king last saw a word. His life knows nothing more than weaponry, conquest and bloodshed.  
  
Much similar to what everyone in this damned castle knows.  
  
Since it would be anomaly for the king to spend moments away from that ornate throne of his, he speaks of his business quickly and discreetly.  
  
"You know you take the throne after me,” and TaeYong wants to snip that jaw off. “I'm most certainly against having an heir who can't pick up a dagger. You begin in a few days.”  
  
_Fighting is pathetic._  
  
"Begin what, father?" TaeYong asks, mustering up non-existent politeness lest he should get his head cut.  
  
The King looks at him, gaze condescending, “Your training, got the best armour for you yesterday.”  
  
Ticked off as he is, TaeYong doesn't want anything more to do with clanging metal blades which he despises above everything. He turns his face away.  
  
_I don’t fucking want it,_ he thinks and the king sighs, reading his thoughts.  
  
"Well son, if you don't kill...you get killed."  
  
The king of Torlan leaves.  
  
TaeYong wishes he left for good.  
  
The ceiling high doors shut. TaeYong slumps in his chair, pen leaking with ink. His face holds an expression of helplessness mingled with disconsolation because he simply couldn’t do anything about his circumstances.  
  
_It is do or die._ But TaeYong felt dying seemed a preferable choice set against becoming overlord of a bloodthirsty army, having conquered acreage beyond reckoning and killed in numbers uncountable.  
  
_Royalty,_ TaeYong writes, the nib digging mercilessly into the paper.  
  
He wonders what heinous crimes had he ever committed in his dreams to have deserved such a designation.  
  
_Distributors of death._

 

 

 

 

   


"I am sick of this," TaeYong says, sitting cross-legged before the rusting bars and peering at Dongyoung's face on the other side.

"Sick of being Prince TaeYong already?" Dongyoung comments, making a move on the chessboard by passing his arm in between the bars. Each day, TaeYong comes to see Dongyoung in the prison. He doesn't have to worry about being followed, only he has the key and all cells are empty except this one.

"Besides that, I'm sick of a lot of things," TaeYong says, raising his eyebrows as he takes Dongyoung's knight by his pawn. Dongyoung smirks, as the prince continues. "I'm sick of dad, sick of their stupidity, sick of the system, sick of this country-"

"Keep going," Dongyoung says and swaps pieces with a mischievous glint in his eye.

"But most of all, I'm sick of seeing you in this prison cell every day. I haven't known what your face looks like without metal over most of it since years," TaeYong says, grinning as if proud of his wit. Dongyoung glares, unimpressed.

"Get used to it. It's life imprisonment you’re never going to see me without bars cutting this handsome image vertically. Your turn, genius," Dongyoung ushers and TaeYong thoughtlessly moves a random piece before getting up to walk towards the lock on Dongyoung's gate.

"What are you doing?" he asks. TaeYong stops, he doesn't miss how Dongyoung sounds afeard, voice shaking.

"Now we can play chess like normal people, come on. Dad said you're free to be out," TaeYong says and proceeds to turn the lock, sliding the jagged door. He finally sees his best friend free before him but Dongyoung isn't doing anything about the shackles.

In fact, Dongyoung sits unmoving, resolute.

"Dongyoung," TaeYong says, spreading his arms and gesturing at the wide open space. "This is your freedom."

"I'd rather stay in here," Dongyoung whispers.

"But why should you?"

"For reasons okay? There are things which you don't know TaeYong—“

"You haven't learnt a speck more than what we were learning together before grandad got you imprisoned. I should be saying there are things you don't know."

“TaeYong, we may be the mighty Torlan, the rising threat to all of humanity but that doesn't give us the upper hand."

"I'm not following," TaeYong says, scratching his head and pursing his lips at the sudden fire in Dongyoung.

"It makes the job easier. The greatest danger lies in our own cradle, nurturing itself in the battles we've won and it keeps growing and waiting—“ Dongyoung chokes out dust and coughs unceasingly.

It’s horrifying, if not anything; to watch Dongyoung break out into unprompted rambles about things beyond his comprehension.

"Dongyoung what even is that? I don't get it."

The younger looks up, a pathetic smile over his face and pity in his eyes. "I don't know. I wish I knew but I don't because when I was going to know, your grand old man got me into this cell, calling me a rebel," he curses. "Should've killed myself when I was that age."

"Don't say stupid things—“

"I want to stay here. This is better than being outside with yon patriotic soldiers who rip maps to choose which country is whose next. I know these things haven't changed and they won't."

"You won't have to be with others, you can stay separately-"

"This is solitary, this is separate. This is safe. In here I can live fifty more, out there,” Dongyoung says, pointing at the direction where lay the door to outside, “I might not last a second.”

"You're being delirious, Dongyoung," TaeYong tells him. There only has to be moment of exasperation before TaeYong decides to break those hooks around Dongyoung's ankles and bring him out forcibly.

"TaeYong," he says breathily and afraid, "all they need, is a trigger."

"What are you even talking about? Speak sense!" TaeYong yells, slamming a hand onto the wall.

Dongyoung looks down, his expression turning weak, and his face colouring blue, "The halls are breaking-"

"The halls, do not exist!" TaeYong shouts.

"Shut it TaeYong," Dongyoung says and gets up to walk further into the cell, away from the opening.

TaeYong stares at him, amazed the incredulousness he's ensuing. "You are being impossible. I haven't lived twenty years of my life believing the world will be dictated by a mundane story written on blocks of stone under water!"

Dongyoung stays silent, he lets TaeYong’s fury come down before speaking gently, “You know, right TaeYong? You've seen it."

"Just stop it. Stop being vague."

"You've seen the empty halls. The home of the—”

“—The destroyers yeah I’ve seen that bullshit so?” TaeYong grabs his forehead by his thumb and forefinger. "There is no such thing as that, it is an ordinary hall, somebody must've made it and that's the end of it."

"But you dreamt about them even before you knew about them! If the empty halls exist then judging by the predicted time, it is breaking! You have to believe me—“

"Dongyoung," TaeYong silences him with a cold tone. "The door is open, you can get out whenever you want to. Freedom has been granted."

Dongyoung looks down and TaeYong watches sadly.

"Lock it."

"Dongyo-"

"Fucking lock it I said. You won't believe me, you won't try to, even though there's nothing much we can do to change anything so just lock the damn door to let me starve, die, decay for all I care, instead of being the monster, if I venture one step from here."

TaeYong doesn't wish to argue anymore, he doesn’t understand what is it his friend is so vexed at. He exhales, throwing the key towards Dongyoung. "In case you change your mind."

But Dongyoung has one last thing to say before TaeYong leaves.

"Don't become that trigger, TaeYong.”

TaeYong may not know what Dongyoung is talking about, but the words persist in his mind. He turns away and walks back to his room. Even in broad daylight, when his shadow thickens, he feels an intangible presence, constantly reminding him of Dongyoung's hysteria.

It makes him frightened, nonetheless.

 

 

 

 

The day Dongyoung was locked up returns to TaeYong’s mind every day. It haunts his head, because somewhere inside he still thinks it’s his fault his friend is in prison. And now in such a mental state that he wants to stay imprisoned.

_“You aren't weak TaeYong, you aren’t.”_

This was what Dongyoung’s soothing voice had told his six year old self. Dongyoung was younger, but TaeYong was used to following his shadow. He was reliable, but that day was odd.

“Dongyoung why are you doing this?” TaeYong had whispered as Dongyoung’s little feet had tripped on their way to the king’s rooms.

“We need to find the keys to the locked chest!” Dongyoung had told him keenly, “Come on! let’s get to the old king’s room!”

TaeYong didn’t walk behind Dongyoung. “But grandpa will…”

“Don’t be like that, this could change everything we know about this country! And then when you’ll be king you won’t have to be like him!”

“I’m not good enough Dongyoung you can’t- what do you even know about the chest how can it help me I _don't want_ its help!”

“All I know is,” Dongyoung had said, turning serious, “that it holds answers to everything.”

“Then I don't want them.”

TaeYong remembers the shock on Dongyoung’s face combined with a questioning look. He had stared at him silently, had let the young prince continue.

“I want to find my own answers,” six year old TaeYong had said and Dongyoung paid no heed.

“I’m still going to open it. And besides, what makes you sure your answers are the right ones?”

TaeYong had sighed and let him go. _Do as you please._

Now he wishes he hadn’t.

The following morning TaeYong's grandfather, the king had locked the chest up yet again in anger and locked young Dongyoung in the lowest of all prison cells for his crime, where only a stream of water continuously came to quench thirst and daylight came in via a narrow hole.

But what was worse was that Dongyoung could hear everything. He could hear the sounds of freedom outside the cell and this served as punishment for he heard freedom which he could not have.

_“Dongyoung…”_

When TaeYong saw his friend being escorted by soldiers, Dongyoung wasn't the same cheerful and cocky young boy. His face bore such sadness as if it had memorised aeons worth of accounts of suffering.

TaeYong had cried a lot, grasping onto Yuta’s arm and found solace in his voice. He had begged his grandad not to imprison his friend.

“No one listens,” were Dongyoung's last words before he had stepped into the cell, that made TaeYong change as well.

_No one will listen._

But as he had passed to look at TaeYong one last time before being taken into the prison, he had given him a key in secret.

And fourteen years later, TaeYong presently shuffles the key in his hands, as it hangs by a thread on his neck tucked inside his shirt usually, to not let anyone see.

_Should I?  
_

 

 

 

“Heading for the library aren’t we?” the scullion asks once TaeYong excuses himself hastily after greeting all the kitchen staff. It’s one of the usual things he does: read, see the people with whom he’s grown up with once in a while, read and read till he feels full enough to write.

“Yes,” TaeYong says, returning a sincere smile, his face lighting up adorably, making the kitchen-maids gush over how they loved the prince or how much of a wonderful lad he’s been since a baby.

TaeYong shyly makes his way to the library, a bit red from all the comments but he stiffens in seriousness when he reaches the door. The knob is there before him. It isn’t so hard, one single push—

The knob stares at him, reminding him of the million times he’s stood before the door to the library, never having the pluck to carry out his intentions.

But today he does. He feels a surge of courage.

TaeYong takes quiet steps inside. An empty royal library, not an uncommon sight, for no one believes reading to be satisfying anymore. Murder in the dark was rewarded with valour before citizens and the coins in the jar of dignity were the numbered by the several slain using knives.

The only thing that has stopped TaeYong from renouncing his royal life has been the access to the inward chambers of the royal library. Stacked with decaying papyri, scrolls untouched for centuries, the oldest records — there might even be journals of kings ages ago but none of those were what TaeYong is looking for.

The air is filthy once TaeYong enters the inward chamber. For a second his heart leaps because the shelves are so tall and arranged in a way that they seem to lean towards the door. He moves carefully, now alone before what was an enormous purple chest with corroded chains huddles over the lock and in TaeYong’s shivering hands is the key.

_This was locked right after Dongyoung tried to open it._

Dongyoung was successful for the most part.

TaeYong turns the lock, it clicks open and the chains slither on the floor. Inside, there sits one thin book. TaeYong snatches it and leaves. Long strides finally bring him back to his room without anyone noticing.

He got what he wanted. He got what Dongyoung had been imprisoned for more than ten years ago.

But he hadn’t expected it would be a thin book like this.

TaeYong bolts the inside of his door, it’s very difficult for him to take the fact that the chest had no dust on it even though it had not been affected in any way since years.

_Don’t think about it._

He flips it open, the book is bound well together, with only the far edges of the paper more brittle but that is no problem since the words are right in the centre. The opening line reads:

  
‘If you’ve seen the empty halls, proceed to read.’

  
TaeYong’s body heats up with fear. It was as if the book knew very well, that he was the only one who had seen the empty halls.

_Or whatever the fuck they are,_ TaeYong adds.

Now he gets why Dongyoung had made a quick copy when he stole the key to the chest. He had made it for him.

Suddenly nauseous, TaeYong pushes the book inside a drawer and shuts it for good. He doesn’t really want to see it. When he closes his eyes, all he can see are the empty halls. They’re beautiful, he could write about them but he finds no word of description.

_Macabre?_

He hears a sudden crash outside his door. Setting his pen down TaeYong goes over to the door. He peers out but there’s no one in sight. TaeYong thinks closing the door behind him to check the entire hallway is the right thing to do but then there’s a tap on his foot which makes him jump.

“Jeez you’re still like this?” he hears a voice say and nearly wants to kick him for two reasons, the first being that he freaked him out and the second was that he’s kneeling.

“Up Yuta, don’t kneel before me it pisses me off,” he says, scoffing. But Yuta just grins from below and it brings tears to his eyes. And in a second TaeYong pulls him up, leaping to hug him, for he has missed everything, he has missed Yuta’s voice, he has missed Yuta’s smile. Not seeing Dongyoung for a multitude of years cannot even be close to how not seeing Yuta for these one and a half have made him feel.

TaeYong holds him. No hug is long enough. This time, TaeYong doesn't have to worry about having to memorise how Yuta pressed up against him feels like, because he's here. With him. Yuta smiles, burying his nose in TaeYong's shoulder, overflowing with happiness from seeing his friend again.

“You're back, asshole,” TaeYong chokes out, he almost wants to cry but there are no tears erupting.

Yuta pulls back to look at him, the dazzling smile over his face and a gentle hand reaching up to brush TaeYong's bangs aside.

“I’m back.”

 

 

 

 

“Tae?” Yuta says, poking his head through the gap between the two doors at daybreak.

“What is it?” TaeYong replies, not lifting his eyes off the purple book trying to figure out what mix of scripts it is written in. He and Yuta often bicker about how they should address each other as _General_ and _Prince_ respectively but TaeYong’s too engrossed in the incomprehensible text of the book to argue.

“I— erm, have a few days off so,” Yuta says and TaeYong turns to look at him incredulously. “There’s no such thing as holidays for soldiers how do you have a few days off?”

Yuta gulps and turns his eyes away, fiddling with his hands nervously and it brings a smile to TaeYong’s face. “I assumed the prince personally requested the commander I would get three days rest now will you come with me?”

“Certainly not doing anything you want after you used my friendship to your advantage,” he retaliates, not really meaning it and bites the inside of his cheek from smiling because he knows Yuta will next get frustrated and it is hilarious to watch.

“I’ve saved your ass more times than you can count, alright! I deserve a break!” Yuta yells and the prince lets out a chuckle.

“Where do you want to go? You’re free to leave just stay safe,” TaeYong says gently and Yuta stares before answering.

“I wanted to go to the lower city,” he mumbles, making the other’s eyes jump out of sockets.

“The lower city? You mean criminals and bandits all under one roof?”

Yuta laughs hysterically at that last comment and TaeYong narrows his eyes, “What is so funny?”

“I’m from the lower city. And you need to change that twisted perception of yours. Not everyone is a murderer or an immoral being here. I was thinking I’d take you with me.”

TaeYong looks at the book on his table. If only he could prove everything in it is bogus, he could get Dongyoung back to normal and hence out of the prison cell. He still doesn’t understand why does he even have it in possession. It was like events were unfolding themselves.

“I-I’ve never been to the city. I’ve never shown myself to the citizens and I know nothing about their lives except—”

“Except from what you’ve read, I know. You are a scholar, you need to see the real thing and after all, it’s been a year and a half without your company. Grab an overcoat, come on.”

TaeYong hides the book under his mattress and puts on a cloak after which he follows Yuta to the secret exit which he knew Dongyoung and Yuta often used when they were kids. TaeYong had never tried to though, always afraid of getting caught.

He lets Yuta drag him into a tunnel, up a ladder made of ropes and the next moment TaeYong sees something he’s never had the fortune to see up close. Markets, houses, little rain pouring on the sidewalk, lifted pavements — he felt he was in another world.

“We’re here. The main square,” Yuta says and smiles as he points excitedly to the various places on the street as he leads TaeYong downtown.

“Why are we going to the citadel?” he asks.

Yuta explains, “Well to most people, no such thing as ‘lower city’ exists. There’s a narrow passage behind a false door. Sheltered locale.”

TaeYong gapes at him, his hood falls down, “WHAT?”

Yuta giggles, “It’s an illusive concept, a way to protect it. You fill in people’s heads that it’s an unsafe and enchanted area and people will never wander near it.”

TaeYong puts up an impressed look, “Smart.” Yuta continues describing the markets and TaeYong notices how the accounts from books come alive from illustrations and texts. Yuta’s descriptions reanimate them.  
  
They stop once in a while and Yuta empties his purse while TaeYong helps him carry the enormous amount of food he keeps buying. Soon it becomes unbearably difficult to carry them and TaeYong complains to Yuta’s ignorant ears.

“Shut up we’re almost there…”

Yuta runs excitedly when he sees a door with dirty green glass, leaving TaeYong with no choice but to follow after, no matter how impossible it seems to fit into the door or how ridiculous it would look.

He would curse, habitually after getting inside the door but more than the breathtaking beauty of the place, he is stricken speechless by the satisfied grin on Yuta’s face. TaeYong has never seen Yuta so happy it seems absurd, and suddenly all those heavy bags of food become worth carrying.

“It hasn’t changed one bit,” Yuta exclaims and TaeYong realises he was staring too much and he awkwardly asks, “Don’t you think people forgot you or—”

“Nah. No chance, I keep writing to them,” Yuta says and grabs TaeYong’s hand.

“Y’know you pulling my hand when I’m already holding so many things is impractical—HEY!”

The next second TaeYong is being dragged into the nearest door, he holds onto the bags in his hand for dear life thinking they’ll fall off from the amount of doorsill crashing Yuta’s caused. The bags drop from his hands and then he notices he’s in a room with a flood of kids.

When he turns to Yuta there’s already so many of them surrounding him, asking for being carried on the shoulder and TaeYong feels oddly too satisfied seeing Yuta happy like this, he looks beautiful and and also glows for some reason. Yuta puts one of the kids down and walks over to TaeYong, both hands reaching out to fix TaeYong’s hood which had fallen back.

“This is where I grew up. Well at least till I was five” Yuta says smiling and though completely mesmerised by him, TaeYong manages to choke out what he comprehends from his surroundings, “An orphanage… I didn’t know we had one because—”

“I told you that you have a twisted idea of everything. Not every Torlan is cruel. And this is one of the places where you’ll see it.”

In the meantime of their conversation, more children gather around, pulling at the ends of their cloaks, asking in high pitched choruses who was it that Yuta had brought with him.

“This is my friend, TaeYong,” he replies, glancing over to him.

The next second, children gather around TaeYong’s legs and he thinks he’ll stumble. _He’s so handsome!_ and _Yuta there’s someone who’s taller than you_ are are what TaeYong hears and for once, he finds something that touches him, he finds something that doesn’t hate about his country.

For once.

Yuta giggles and walks to him, “Liking it?”

“Yeah,” he replies, “I’ll send some gold here. Make this place a bit bigger—”

“You don’t have to worry about that, that’s my department,” Yuta says and asks him to sit inside the guest room while he goes over and distributes all the stacks of food they’ve bought. To the prince this place is like another ray of hope, where the foundations of a different country lie. What he could create, the first ray of hope being that people like Dongyoung existed, who valued change and life over everything.

Yuta is the general of Torlan’s army. TaeYong still doesn’t know why Yuta is in the army, when he isn’t someone who is heartless. He knows Yuta isn’t like the rest. He is sure of it.

TaeYong keeps looking out of the window, a portal to the outside of the lower city, open spaces, and it is bizarre, people are actually beaming. They look so happy it makes TaeYong take up the resolve to turn the whole nation, colonies included around— into something like that. Not like the Torlan outside the passage, where the atmosphere was so depressing that the skies were grey.

_This is new; this is nice._ TaeYong can see what Yuta was talking about.

He sees a tiny figure by the door that snaps him out of his thoughts and for a second TaeYong freezes, the child looks like he wants to come to him.

TaeYong may have a lot of cousins he doesn’t know names of but he’s certainly never played with a child. He gets off his chair and beckons him but then he hears Yuta approaching, “There you are! You shouldn’t walk little guy,” he says. It is only when Yuta picks him up when he notices TaeYong watching.

TaeYong doesn’t know what to do when Yuta places the boy in his lap without delay, he is really small; settling comfortably over his legs. His eyes are emotionless but when they find TaeYong’s the prince gives him a smile. The kid hugs him out of the blue.

Yuta jumps in excitement. “See? He likes you!”

TaeYong utters with his voice raspy, “Now what do I do?” to which Yuta glares and TaeYong nervously pats the kids back. In a few moments, he falls asleep, head lolling on the prince’s shoulder. He looks adorable with squished cheeks and closed eyes. Yuta walks forward and strokes the child’s hair.

“His parents died in that fire last week, I was told,” Yuta informs him, gravely. Although TaeYong wants to fight it, yet he breaks down, droplets of brine falling on his cloak. He knows all of them had something similar, a story of loss which they were too young to have seen or remembered.

_Nobody deserves a fate like this._

“He was pulled out at the last minute, but his leg is a bit burnt so he can’t walk properly; but he has the spirit enough to run,” Yuta says and TaeYong wipes his tears.

“Was that due to the holocaust by my father…last week? Was that what caused his house to burn?” TaeYong asks, crestfallen.

Yuta nods and continues with words that break the prince more, “It wasn’t just his house though. Many more are like him. He wasn’t even named.”

TaeYong looks up at Yuta and his voice cracks as he says, “How about Jisung?”

Yuta’s lips quiver, he presses them trying to contain his tears.

“Jisung sounds beautiful.”

 

 

 

 

By evening they’re back in the palace, roaming around random halls and chambers, and TaeYong cannot confine his curiosity. There’s guilt building inside him, such which he cannot excuse nor destroy. Torlan royalty hasn’t merely killed numbers of people, they’ve destroyed other’s lives despite them being alive. He doesn’t remember anything about Yuta except the day he was brought in, to be trained to lead the army. He felt honoured he got to see where he came from, or that there is some place that doesn’t mirror his ghastly assumptions of his country.

“What about…your family Yuta?” TaeYong asks, for the nth time and he knows Yuta will say the same ‘there’s nothing to know about.’

Yuta stops in his tracks, rethinking his words over and over again before answering, “There’s nothing left to know about.”

TaeYong bites his bottom lip, it’s alright if Yuta doesn’t want to speak about it, he’s not exactly the most open person. But the prince keeps envisioning images of the king snatching away Yuta from a life he deserved and into an abyss of torture.

Yuta gives TaeYong a fake smile, “You wouldn’t want to know too. But I have family…”

TaeYong looks into his eyes, waiting for his answer. “There’s Dongyoung,” Yuta says truthfully, “And you.”

As Yuta sees TaeYong to his door, he’s filled with hopes of a better place, like what he’d showed the prince today.

_I will do anything to protect you,_ he thinks, walking back to his room.

 

 

 

 

TaeYong’s nights are mostly sleeplessly spent. He’s afraid the moment he closes his eyes there’ll be a nightmare awaiting in some corner of his mind so he keeps writing, trying to make sense of what is in the book Dongyoung had probably wanted him to read fourteen years ago.

There are dates, events everything seems otherworldly, he’s reaching the end of the book knowing everything but still wight a feeling that there is more than what meets the eye.

_It doesn’t make sense,_ he thinks, forehead hitting the table. _I’m not correlating anything._

He gets up like a spring when he hears a clang on his table. He looks at Yuta who is most likely judging his appearance. “I brought soup genius.”

TaeYong groans. “Who even has soup in the morning…”

“It’s evening.”

To avoid further argument, Yuta eagerly drags TaeYong’s limp body outside by the elbow to show him the pink sky and the setting sun. “Let’s go to the garden.”

TaeYong splashes water on his face, _I am never going to match Yuta’s energy._

The walk to the garden is a familiar route, it’s well kept. They finish Yuta’s cooking and casually stroll around, TaeYong is still sleepy but his dozes are often broken by Yuta’s high pitched squeals of _TaeYong don’t sleep there’s drool!_ but TaeYong is wide awake when the reach the old garden.

He leaves Yuta abruptly and runs towards the gate, the path is crowded with weeds and tall plants but he knows what he’s searching for.

_The door to the empty halls, it’s somewhere around…_

  
TaeYong stops before a tree with the bark scratched for clearance.

_Found it._

  
He thinks back to the time when he stumbled and fell over a door covered in ivy and moss with a latch waiting to be pulled in this very garden. He remembers going inside, down the stairs into large grey rooms without a speck of dust. Bare grey walls and as true to it’s name— empty.

He hadn't known the chambers he wandered off to in his dreams existed until that moment.

There was no one when TaeYong first went in there but then, the legend says there's no one that you can see.

It leaves the mind questioning if there stays someone in there, someone invisible to the eye, imperceivable by the senses.

_But who? And why there?_

These are the questions colliding in his mind as he feels over the grass for the latch. "I don't like nettles," Yuta says repulsed and trying to reach where he was. TaeYong fishes around, waiting for something solid to hit his foot but there's nothing yet.

_I swear it was here and now...gone?_

"Are you done? I'm trying to enjoy my holiday with my best friend, Prince TaeYong and not my nemesis, garden bugs and thorny plants,” he hears Yuta complain.

TaeYong stares at the patch of grass in disbelief. The empty halls couldn't have moved away. They just couldn't. “I’m coming,” he says.

_How could the chamber disappear?_

He doesn't want Yuta to notice how pale he is once he walks back to him. "Rough days?” Yuta asks anyway, grinning.

"I'm astonished you care," TaeYong says sarcastically and walks them back to the humongous garden, watching birds dunk themselves in water and chirp loud enough to deafen. “I think I should be asking you how your stay away from the capital has been, since I haven’t yet.”

"Great, I guess. Five weeks in Ennismore and—“

"Oh right. You went to finish off the royal bloodline there," TaeYong says and Yuta averts his eyes, nervously.

"Yeah I had. But that's insignificant," he hastily adds and Taeyong notices the shiver in his voice and forced laughter. "The king wants to take over Ennismore," Yuta adds, trying to change the topic.

He thinks TaeYong won't figure out that he's hiding something but there's nothing TaeYong doesn't know about Yuta. Along with Dongyoung, the three have been the closest friends to not know each other's minds.

But if it comforts Yuta, TaeYong plays along. "It's expected the geezer isn't satisfied with having the entire continent under his control." Yuta laughs a little at that but as TaeYong is looking he zones out, lost in thoughts of somewhere else. TaeYong fears that look on his face is what he thinks it is.

Undeniably, Yuta looks lovestruck.

"I tried suggesting we had nothing much to gain from a small island country like Ennismore so why bother?" Yuta says and TaeYong links their fingers together as they make their way over to the bridge over the garden pond.

_Could it be someone else? Does it have to be, after I’ve waited— does it really have to be someone else?_

"That's unlikely of you, the great commander of our army to spare a country. Is there someone you love or something in Ennismore?" the prince asks, irked and his tone more inquisitive that he’d wanted.

TaeYong is joking, but Yuta pulls back his hand from his and walks forward.

"Yes," Yuta says, turning back to face TaeYong. The prince's face falls. He ears don't want to believe what they're hearing.

"I fell in love," Yuta confesses, unaware of how he's shattering TaeYong inside from the revelation.

"With an Ennismoran?" TaeYong asks and Yuta nods, expecting TaeYong to be angry or scold him for this. But TaeYong smiles. For a second Yuta thinks it looks agonized but then TaeYong changes it into a wide grin.

"Well that is great, you found your happiness."

 

 

 

 

“Who do we have here! Good morning your highness,” Dongyoung says as soon as he hears TaeYong approaching and gives a hearty laugh at how he retorts with yelling profanities. “What brings you here?”

"The empty halls," TaeYong breathes, panting as if he had run to save himself from becoming roadkill.

Dongyoung turns to face him, he can see TaeYong is so afraid. He’d rather not believe TaeYong was even considering agreeing to his theories but he knows this is fear.

Pure fear.

"What about them?” Dongyoung says, he figures he needs to be wary.

"They-They've fucking _disappeared,"_ TaeYong says sounding maniacal. There was such fright that even Dongyoung felt his spine chill and breath stop. TaeYong drops a pile of papers inside the cell and whispers, “I tried to make sense out of that purple book…but I still don’t believe anything.”

“You brought me your notes,” Dongyoung utters to which TaeYong nods and asks in a muted voice, “What do you think of the halls?”

"They are virtual chambers," Dongyoung says, trying to sound composed, “It must've changed places.”

"But doesn't that stupid legend or story say it changes places before a— _pivotal_ period in time?"

Dongyoung speaks, hands fiddling with the chains. "You seem to know more about the legend than I do."

TaeYong sighs, his hands gripping the bars hard, fingers staining from the rust. There are sweat beads trickling down his forehead and his back is warming as if susceptible to looming danger.

"Is something going to happen?" TaeYong asks, feebly.

Dongyoung looks at him, miserably his turn worried.

"I don't know, Tae. I don't know."

 

 

 

 

_This country is— and now I’ve run out of curses._

The prince rips his shirt off, he's been feeling uncomfortably hot and he can't take it. He runs a hand through his auburn hair and lets his angry kick to his table show how he wants to escape this kingdom. TaeYong falls back on his bed, letting the cool air hit his torso.

_If those stupid chambers are the empty halls, then every bullshit that will happen according to legend…will happen._

He can’t stop and think about baseless stories sculpted out of thin air which were believed to be the prophesy for aeons to come because, frankly, TaeYong thought it was all a huge load of tosh.

_And the pathetic thing is that every flipping country has a different legend. I’ve not a clue which one is going to happen. Misleading, all of it._

TaeYong stares up at the high ceiling, the shields and murals shining animate above him.

_Maybe Dongyoung has gone nuts. Just maybe, but I know him, he isn't insane; he's smart._

_But it's all foreshow by no one,_ TaeYong ponders. _Those don't happen, they can't happen, we make our reality and there's nothing that can govern circumstances..._

But he'd really thought it was fate that had brought Yuta to him.

There is a white scarf, tucked in his drawer, much similar to the black one he'd earlier gifted Yuta. He had wanted to tell him about how he felt, had wanted to give it as a token of his love but he thinks it's all valueless now.

A pained laugh comes out of him.

_It was fate that brought Yuta to me but fate also decided what I wouldn't get to keep._

His door creaks open and the said person in his thoughts comes inside, TaeYong doesn’t want to face his feelings, he understands if things don’t ever go his way because when do they ever? He’ll be king, taking more lives than the amount of air he breathes and Yuta will wear the black scarf, a symbol of their friendship and TaeYong can see he still has it circling his neck though stitched at one area; Yuta will still be in love with that Ennismoran.

"I didn't call you," TaeYong says and doesn't even get up from where he's lying on the bed.

"Do you know what time it is?" Yuta tells him, ignoring the status boundaries as if he had the right to scold TaeYong. He wants to ask him why his shirt is absent but he doesn't, it's embarrassing.

"I don't know one or something?" The prince says, playing with his locks and a few strands of hair fall softly over his forehead, making Yuta lose his breath for a moment.

The general gulps. He shouldn’t still make me feel like this.

"It's three in the morning. You haven't slept, you idiot," Yuta says gritting his teeth and walking over to TaeYong's figure still pressed on the bed.

"I've been having bad days recently...can't sleep," TaeYong drawls and looks up at Yuta hovering over him. The prince’s mouth is hanging open to take quick breaths thanks to his heart beating so fast that it might run out.

Yuta doesn't seem to notice the effect he has on TaeYong. He picks up TaeYong's shirt from the bed. "Get up," he says and the prince gets up so that Yuta can put the shirt behind him but then he stubbornly falls back again after sliding his arms through the sleeves.

Yuta grabs his shirt to button it up but TaeYong dribbles his fingers under Yuta's chin, interrupting him and bringing him closer. Yuta is weak for his touch, his arms fail to push him away.

_Why?_ he asks himself. _Why is it this way?_

TaeYong is staring tenderly, his eyes are beautiful, a perfect shape; the kind Yuta once imagined getting lost in.

_That’s all past._

Yuta curses inside. TaeYong always gets his breath caught up and heart racing.

"What"

"It's a pity I lost you," TaeYong says, his button eyes turning into sad orbs. Lost me? Yuta wonders but the prince hastily flips them so that Yuta is lying on his back and TaeYong over him. Yuta bites his lips, trying to hold back the odd mix of emotions he’s feeling as TaeYong hugs him like he's the only one he has.

And what makes Yuta feel worse is that he knows he is the only one TaeYong has.

What’s more awful than having no family is having one and yet feeling alone. Yuta understands that. He strokes TaeYong’s hair and the prince holds him tighter, making him feel the weight of the loneliness and despair. Both have gotten forward by themselves, not relying on anyone, choosing not to depend and building a wall like those of this fortified country, around themselves.

They've gotten where they are because they have only had each other for trust and support, with Dongyoung in the prison.

TaeYong must be in a shit position, he doesn't want to be someone like his father. Life can't be about destroying and plundering for him. Yuta knows TaeYong is a good man. He shouldn't be king simply because it would defile him.

"I am here, you haven't lost me," Yuta says comfortingly, the flutters in his stomach now becoming unbearable as he realises TaeYong is pressed up against him and he can hear the rampant thumps of his heart against his own.

TaeYong shakes his head and pulls back to look Yuta in the eye, making Yuta breathless, just like the first time they saw each other. Nostalgia floods him and he shoves the images of their first meeting away.

_Don’t,_ he tells himself.

"Do you remember, wh-when everyone said I was incompetent, that I didn't deserve the throne, you came and told me you would love me no matter what I achieved?” TaeYong says and Yuta gapes at him, stricken dumb by the fact that TaeYong remembers.

_But that was when I loved you._

He nods at the prince.

TaeYong then asks him softly, "I...I wanted to repay you, by becoming someone worthy of your love, but I figure it's too late?"

Yuta shudders. And he feels the urge to push TaeYong away. Simultaneously, he feels the urge to pull him towards himself too.

_No I can’t possibly have thought that._

Like that ball years ago, when TaeYong had swayed them together in the ballroom till midnight, keeping him close and warm, the tiny distance between them making Yuta ache in want for him.

_Stop thinking like you did when thirteen, Yuta. Stop it._

Yuta conjures up all his self-restraint.

_I don’t love TaeYong. Not anymore. I’ve let go of him._

But he doesn't push him away. He doesn't know why he doesn't as TaeYong brushes his knuckles over Yuta's jaw, lovingly staring down, making Yuta blush and in Yuta’s eyes TaeYong is radiant. He looks happy, extremely contented.

"Have you lost all feelings you had for me?"

Yuta stares dazed at TaeYong, heat arises where his hands are resting on TaeYong's bare skin, how when he was thirteen, he had dreamt of being with the prince, having him close like this and here it was now, happening.

He could feel lower, he could bring him closer, after all he did love him once, didn't he?

But Yuta has made a choice, and it isn't TaeYong.

He says to him sharp and cold, "I'm afraid I have."

_I loved him long back, things have changed. I know where my loyalty lies._

Yuta should be mad at TaeYong for bringing back feelings from the past. But then the prince gets up and apologises for making him uncomfortable, his manners and words winning him like they had years ago. There was a time when Yuta thought he belonged with him, the prince. Now, Yuta thinks it was the wrong prince.

“I’m sorry,” TaeYong says and brushes a hand through his hair. Yuta turns his head away, concealing a reddening cheek as the prince buttons his shirt up messily.

"Can we keep reading books and dissing stupid rulers till morning?" TaeYong asks and Yuta cannot find it in himself to say no to his friend.

"It is morning," he replies, flicking TaeYong’s forehead and smiling. "I'll be here with shitload of history books when I don’t have work.”

TaeYong gives Yuta a sad, yet satisfied smile.

"I'll be waiting, then.”

Sunlight pours into his room and the prince begins writing like his routine told him to.

_Love and fate might be disparate things after all.  
_

 

 

 

 

“I brought history books,” Yuta says shoving his head in between the two large doors, showing all his teeth and TaeYong smiles up from his books, all too used to it.

“Nice, now let’s begin the dissing,” he says and Yuta sits across from him on the floor, eyeing all the books sprawled around them.

“You doubled your reading quota I see,” he remarks and TaeYong shuts his eyes tight.

“Well I got nothing to do most days. I can’t fight, as you know. Dad thinks you’re the best kind of company I could have but he’s disappointed I’m not yet influenced.”

To this Yuta laughs, the sound ringing in the prince’s ears and sending a pang of pain into his heart as he fakes a good-natured smile. In a few moments, they forget about dissing rulers— TaeYong engrossed in his book and Yuta finding something to read since he hadn’t read much for the one and half year he’d been gone. The gorge on some food once in a while, some odd banter about how Dongyoung looks like he’s got a moustache coming and how TaeYong often goes to see him.

It’s the dead of the night.

“TaeYong…” Yuta says, all of a sudden in such a way that he instantly wakes up from his book trance.

“Hm?”

“Are you alright? I mean— you haven’t been taking care of yourself and—”

TaeYong returns to his book. “I’m fine. Just afraid.”

“Afraid?”

“Look Yuta I can’t do any of this stuff. I can’t be what dad is. I know I’m prince and everything and there’s this pathetic policy of ‘massacre is best’ that I can’t—I can’t snatch away what people cherish. I’m afraid tomorrow he’ll force me into killing and I’m afraid I’m too weak to stand up to the stupid system.”

Yuta takes TaeYong’s hand in his, looking serious and he quietly tells him, “You know when you’ll get the throne, this will be a changed country. Because these hands,” he looks TaeYong in the eye, “Are not made to kill.”

TaeYong keeps gazing at his calloused hand and Yuta’s soft palm over his wrist. He’s afraid of a lot more but he can’t find it in himself to speak about it.

“I don't know what might happen to me under influence but just know,” TaeYong takes a deeper breath and Yuta’s heart runs frantic once he continues with more words that make him nervous for no reason, “If you're the general of the army even then you'll be gone away from the capital and I-I won't see you as frequently as I'm fortunate enough to see you now and I’m speaking rubbish but just know…” TaeYong says and Yuta holds his breath.

“That I love you even though I know you are betrothed to—to someone else.”

Yuta gets up, he can't hurt his friend anymore. He knows how tormenting it is to see someone you love and not have them, he know what it is like. He’s felt it before for TaeYong and he’s felt it badly, waiting all those moonlit nights for Hansol to show up.

And he still thinks only about each of those moonlit nights. Chronologically, all vivid in his memory. He can’t do anything, he can’t return TaeYong’s feelings even though he outright knows that being in love with an Ennismoran is plain torture because it’s something impermanent and impossible.

“I’m going to sleep.” Yuta says getting up to leave and avoid any more confessions from TaeYong. _I’m in love with Hansol, I don’t have to remind myself because I just am._

“It's a long walk from here,” the prince tells him, concerned.

“I’m the general I'll be alright,” he replies, hand grazing the knob.

“I know you will, I might just go to the library and find company with books.”

Yuta coerces himself to smile and then he shuts the door. Yuta guesses the time might be half past twelve and everything is dead silent as he makes his way over to the secret exit, beginning his steps through the system of tunnels.

TaeYong looks sadly into his book. He hears an absurd sound and the last thing TaeYong sees before blacking out is claws reaching for his face.

 

 

 

 

_I should have brought a lamp, this tunnel is damn dark,_ Yuta thinks as he keeps to the walls and tries to walk steadily though all he can see is blackness.

There’s weight in his heart, a pit in his stomach and odd forms of pain and nausea running across his brain and body. Why does it have to be now that TaeYong tells him he loves him? Why now when he’d gotten over fantasies of the past? Yuta grasps onto Hansol’s amulet, hanging by his chest; he’d stolen it but at least it’s something he has to remember him by.

_I feel sick, I need to get back to my room._ Yuta thinks he’s pretty lost when he comes towards a junction of three tunnels. _Middle one, but I might bang my head on one—_

He swears he heard a scream so loud the walls of the tunnel shook. It travels along a gust of wind, chilling him.

Yuta shrugs it off. _Probably another fire._

Not nauseous anymore, but equally stiff with fear, Yuta takes a few more steps forward, hoping for a nice meal and sleep.

Then the hair on the back of his neck stands up.

He stops walking. For some reason he finds himself running back to the castle, under the dim light of the moon, past the nightly guards who don’t question his authority anyway.

He’s running, adrenaline pumping through him and his heart is in his throat as he reaches TaeYong’s door. _I’ve only been gone for minutes…_

TaeYong isn’t inside.

_I might just go to the library and find company with books,_ Yuta remembers him saying and that’s nothing unusual. He shouldn’t worry just because TaeYong often stays in the library till morning.

He shouldn’t worry just because he heard an unprompted scream. _I’ll sleep here and he’ll come back._

He settles on the bed and closes his eyes.

_He’ll come back._

 

 

 

 

There are spinning images.

Black mist.

Claws.

Shadows.

He's hearing no sound but his ears pain as if he's deafened.

_What is happening?_

When TaeYong wakes up, he sees Yuta. Asleep before him. He’s back in his room, unaware of where he was before and he wants to run over to him in relief that he’s back in his room and not in whichever realm he was but he feels claws on his arms, restraining him and cutting into his skin.

_Drip._

One drop of blood falls down from where the claw is on his arm. TaeYong watches as it splatters on the floor.

He knows if he struggles, he’ll cut both of them. The bladed arms—

_Wait, blades? Arms?_

TaeYong slowly turns his head to the side, to get a look at who or what is holding him back but as soon as he does, in sheer horror, how he wishes he hadn’t.

The moon gets hid by a cloud and the little light falls on Yuta’s peaceful sleeping figure.

All the blood drains off from TaeYong’s face as he sees his captor. Faceless, headless a cloaked figure with sharp metalled claws for hands and a hood perched in thin air.

He lets out a scream, Yuta does’t wake up. Nothing stirs. It’s almst as if he had screamed into vacuum— he couldn’t even hear himself. There’s a flash and he sees another of those headless beings stretch a knife above Yuta’s chest.

_No._

_This has to be a nightmare._

TaeYong screams again, and again it is soundless, it fails to wake Yuta up but it does stop the hooded apparition from stabbing his best friend.

TaeYong pants as the pain from the claws jabbing his forearms sinks in. _Yuta wake up, run._

_Please wake up_.

“Don’t kill him,” he says helplessly. “Please don’t I’m begging you!”

The hooded apparition turns itself towards him, it heard me? TaeYong hears a voice in his head.

‘And what do we get in return?’

TaeYong shouts desperately, “Take me, not him. Kill me and not him, I swear I’ll give you anything just not him!”

A blow to his head numbs out his senses as he watches the headless being stake the knife through his heart.

‘You could be of use to us.’

And he feels absolutely nothing, he sees the splash of blood— his own blood spurting out of his chest, not realising he’ll never wake the same again.

 

 

 

 

The next morning, the whole castle is running insane as Yuta gets every damn room searched, every corner looked thoroughly, even every small gap between furniture checked.

But he doesn’t find TaeYong.

He’d barged into the library as soon as he had woken up, only to find an empty useless room full of books. He retraced their steps, the garden they went to, the tunnel underground but they had the similarity— no TaeYong there.

Yuta wasn’t giving up. He couldn’t, TaeYong would never have gone anywhere without telling him it wasn’t possible.

“I’m positive the prince would mind you snooping around his things,” a voice says and Yuta looks up from where he’s digging TaeYong’s drawer, in hopes of a clue to his location.

“Shut up Winwin, get lost,” he growls and Winwin stares by the curtains, a bit hurt by the spiteful tone of the general.

“Maybe he needed time away from this castle?” he suggests and Yuta’s heart stops.

_Time away…away from me because I’m hurting him?_

“I said shut up!” Yuta shouts and Winwin goes out, leaving Yuta alone in TaeYong’s room. Yuta slumps on the wall. Maybe it is my fault, I should have stayed with him, I shouldn’t have decided to go back to my own room— why didn’t I? Why didn’t I?

Yuta’s gaze falls on a wrapped object, he grazes his fingers over it. What words it has written on it makes Yuta throw it away.

‘From TaeYong, to Yuta.’

He doesn’t want to open it. It’s a gift for him but all he can think of is how TaeYong is gone.

“It’s one day, I’m sure his highness will be alright and back,” Yuta hears Winwin say again and a solacing hand alights on his shoulder.

He can hope, if that’s the least.

“I thought I told you to shut up,” Yuta says and Winwin helps him unto his feet, handing him a cloth to wipe his tears with.

_He’ll be back._

 

 

 

 

A week goes by and the prince is still missing. The high king of Torlan asks Yuta to dismiss all search parties and resume complete focus on armament.

On being questioned as to why, he quietly tells it’s useless to search any longer— the chances of finding him are none.

“I’m not going to stop searching,” Yuta opposes. The king strokes his beard and says, “It might be highly possible you might not find him alive. And I cannot see that. As of now, you are a member of the senate. And…”

Yuta cocks one of his brows.

“I would like you to succeed me, now that my son is gone.”

_What? You are going to push me into kingship just because TaeYong is—_

Yuta can’t hold it anymore. “Did you kill TaeYong, your highness?”

The king’s expression turns sour, expectedly, “What sort of accusation is this!”

“The direct sort. Please answer me,” Yuta demands sternly.

“I did not and speak no further. You can leave.”

“Gladly, as for the proposal, I refuse to be king,” he says turning to exit.

“But if I come to know that you did something to him, your highness, _I won’t think twice about reddening my hands with your blood.”  
_

 

 

 

 

“You remembered me quite early, eh? I though we were best friends,” the prisoner says as he picks at the metal crowning his ankles while Yuta rams his head against the metal bars, frustrated at how Dongyoung could still find time for humour when his head is on the verge of explosion.

“TaeYong never told me how to get down here, okay Dongyoung, now cut that please.”

“So…TaeYong didn’t tell you or you never made an indication of being curious enough to know, because…TaeYong would tell you anything, he’s madly in love with you.”

“Could you not!”

“Alright, I’m sorry. What is it that you want? Because it’s not like I can do anything for you— I’m obviously in a prison cell—”

“TaeYong has been missing for a week. He used to come here daily so you must know where he could have possibly gone.”

“Unfortunately I don’t. We only played chess and chatted for an hour a day.”

“Dongyoung I’m requesting you— he’s really gone without a trace. Disappeared into thin air, I don’t know how but I need to find him.”

“Did you say…a week ago?”

“Yes, I did?”

Dongyoung sits silently. “And the last time you saw him was…”

“The last moon,” Yuta hastily tells him.

A hush falls over the place. Dongyoung stares with his mouth agape at Yuta before forcing his shaking lips to speak.

“He’s gone, Yuta. You’re never going to find him.”

“Dongyoung don’t say that…”

“Believe me.”

Yuta walks grumpily away, not accepting that TaeYong is missing and would remain missing. Dongyoung sighs sadly into the dusty floor of the prison.

_You’re never going to find him. Because he’ll come to you._

_And I do not know what is worse.  
_

 

 

 

 

There’s an old bench facing the garden, that’s where Yuta remembers he and TaeYong spent a lot of time after Dongyoung got into prison. He stares up, the moon is shining; he thinks it looks better when viewed from Hansol’s balcony. He smiles, the memories healing his stinging heart for a second.

Nostalgically, the environment swirls into something similar to Ennismore making Yuta’s chest swell up in expectation. The wind howls, he’s alone, there is gorgeous moonlight besides the darkness all over the white lilies and—

Yuta hears footsteps.

He turns his head to see the castle behind him, there’s no one coming from there that could produce a sound like that; the senate were having their meeting on the highest floor, he could see the nonsensical discussion from the large windows.

More footsteps intrude his thoughts.

He gets up, instinctively, his thumb pops his sword out.

“Who is it?”

A bush sways before him, from the direction of the old garden gate. It sways uncoordinated with the blowing wind. Agitated, Yuta snares, “Who is it! Come out now!”

From the gap between two densely leafed trees, he sees a figure approaching him.

“TaeYong…” Yuta breathes out, relieved. _He’s come back. Winwin was right, I knew he’d come back. I knew it._

On the impulse of happiness Yuta wants to leap and hug him, but he finds himself incapable of movement. He’s stiff as a stone.

_Why are my legs— why can’t I move?_

Yuta goes pale, TaeYong keeps walking closer and it’s weird. He should be happy and run towards him but his steps are ominously slow. The reason behind why Yuta’s fear rises with each step is known to him only when his eyes run over his chest.

_He’s been stabbed. In the heart. H-He couldn’t have survived it—_

“General!” Yuta hears two lieutenants call and charge towards TaeYong but he snaps their necks broken with one swift movement.

Yuta watches in horror as both the lieutenants fall dead at his feet, the scene is ghastly.

And even ghastlier is the fact that Yuta has to look into the eyes of his friend in search of a reason responsible for his actions but all Yuta sees is red eyes, bloody and diabolic.

There’s no thinking twice left; he knows _his_ neck is the one that’ll be snapped next.

_But this can’t be…he wouldn’t do this._

TaeYong looks at Yuta, head tilting to the side. Horrendous is what he looks, there’s nothing left of the princely charm and grace. He emits a predatory aura and Yuta whimpers, shivering and frightened to the bone, “TaeYong…are—”

TaeYong walks and whispers with a breath that resembles a deathly chill into his ear, “TaeYong? Who is that?”

It isn’t his voice.

Yuta exhales nervously, he looks at him again, it looks like TaeYong but is nothing like the prince he knows. _Right. This is a joke. A very bad joke._

“Snap out of it! It isn’t funny—”

Yuta can’t explain how the red eyes could be a joke and his suspicions are confirmed when TaeYong reaches for his neck.

_You aren’t my TaeYong._ Yuta closes his eyes shut as the coarse fingers incision his throat— it will be over in a few moments for him.

_What are you?_

A piercing bullet is fired out of nowhere into TaeYong’s arm and he disappears into a black mist that flies away with the wind, letting Yuta fall limp on the ground.

Still perplexed, with his heart pummelling like a madman Yuta pants audibly. None of this is a dream, he can still see the two dead lieutenants, he can still see the terrifying TaeYong-like apparition that had come to kill him in his brain.

He can still see those red eyes in his mind, haunting and maleficent; where once kind black one’s resided. He remembers what Dongyoung said and he beats his chest as he grieves. _He’s…gone, my TaeYong is gone._

“General, are you hurt?” he hears someone run up to him from behind. Yuta looks up from his watery eyes and the person bends down to wipe them, offering him a hand to stand up.

Yuta stares at him. “Winwin?”

“Yes, I hope he didn’t hurt you,” he says inspecting his neck. “You’re lucky.”

There’s a revolver in Winwin’s hand. Yuta strings the dots— Winwin had saved him. “Thank you,” he says but his heart is still running he somehow feels danger around them.

“Don’t speak of it,” Winwin says and gives his shoulder a comforting squeeze. Yuta is still has tears flowing down his face, trying to convince himself it was illusion, hallucination, hysteria but it couldn’t have been.

“Was this real, Winwin? Did-did he…?” he asks weakly and Winwin gives him a nod before jumping to catch Yuta as he falters, unable to bear anything and wails.

“I could explain General Yuta but— I think I should take you someplace he doesn’t know. It’ll be safer.”

Yuta thinks silently and Winwin gives him support to stand. “We need to leave. Now.” Yuta commands walking confidently with his sword stiff in hand.

_I’ve lost you I’m sorry, TaeYong. I let this happen and I’ll never forgive myself until I hunt them down— whomsoever has done this to you._

“What?” Winwin squeaks.

“If I stay, tomorrow I will be tried for the murder of these two officers and I have nothing to defend myself with, Winwin. So we need to leave, or you can stay, it’s no different.”

“I will defend you,” he replies but Yuta is heading towards the tunnels with him following.

“There is nothing you can do— if I have supporters I also have those who want me in that execution tower—”

In the distance the second floor of the castle blasts. The watch the fire rise up like a phoenix in contrast to the ethereal dark and Yuta undeniably sees TaeYong’s figure walking away from the rooftop— red like inferno blazing in his eyes.

“The Senate…”

Yuta drags Winwin into the tunnel and shuts the opening, locking it. They run frantically, afraid and Yuta only takes a breath when he’s on the shore of Torlan looking over to the sea. There’s a tiny boat hidden in a corner and Yuta pulls it out and throws it into the ocean.

“Come on,” he gestures and soon enough he and Winwin are sailing away from the cursed country in a direction only Yuta knows.

“Where are we going?” Winwin asks him and Yuta moves the oar faster, more enormous flames and sounds of fire are what they hear as they look at the peninsula of their motherland disappear from sight as distance increases.

“Ennismore,” Yuta tells him. Winwin makes a questioning expression.

Yuta wants to explain but he utters only a sentence to summarise.

“There’s someone I have to be with.”

 

 

 

 

With the candle wax of the last candle Dongyoung has to keep his cell lit up corroding, he peers at the dying flame.

Unknowingly, a funeral song plays upon his lips and he knows it it suits the occasion. Soon the castle corridors would be as empty as this very prison.

A shrouding cloud moves over the moon and Yuta looks all around him, no horizon separating the dark sky and the black ocean water. Yuta clasps his hands and hopes Hansol is waiting too, like he is.

Yuta closes his eyes, Winwin rows the boat and they’re alone, surrounded by glistening water. Wind slaps against his forehead, brushing his bangs away and his eyes hurt, they’re swollen from all the crying.

For some reason, a funeral tune invades his mind. swinging along with the breeze.

It all felt like a nightmare, but it was too real to be untrue.

Yuta shuts his eyes for the last time, muttering an apology to TaeYong and letting a few tears fall unashamedly.

Tomorrow seems menacing, he thinks there’s more unspeakable things awaiting him. But he can catch his breath for sometime, there’s only the water and the cool wind he should focus on. He needs to find TaeYong’s killer, and then all his misery would end.

Yuta shuts his eyes for sleep.

There is no end; is what he doesn’t realise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. sequel coming ~~when I feel energetic enough to type~~ soon  
>  2\. "your hands are not made to kill" is from fmab obviously


End file.
